Whales And Aurora - The Shipwreck review
Band: | Whales And Aurora |
Album: | The Shipwreck |
Style: | Atmospheric sludge metal |
Release date: | May 2012 |
01. Refused Recounting Words
02. Achieving The Unavoidable
03. The Aground Hard-Ship
04. Abandoned Among Echoes
05. Awakened By The Aurora
06. A New Awareness
07. Floating On Calm Waters
What? An eclectic mix of doom, post, gaze, and psychedelic influences based around a nautical theme? To quote Homer J Simpson, "Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter. "
The Shipwreck marks the debut of the Italian seafaring quintet, Whales And Aurora.
Musically these mariners are much more akin to their Netherlander counterparts in Ortega than the German disciples of Melville, although Ahab seems to have turned in this direction as well.
The songs and the album itself build, ebb, and flow based primarily around the regularly charted waters of the prototypical post-metal build up, only W&A seem to execute it more convincingly than most the similar releases I've reviewed. Both songs and the album in general also fall away to quiet, serene sections.
Much like the sea itself, the album is a mix of tranquil beauty and raging waters.
Some of the tracks feature raw-throated, hoarse shouted vocals espousing Sartre-esque views on consuming a steady diet of negativity and, thus, accepting angst. Give the band credit for deviating from the obvious shipwreck-centric lyrics one might expect.
The remainder of the tracks, "The Aground Hard-ship", "Awakened By The Aurora", and "Floating On Calm Waters" (a beautiful album closer) are instrumental pieces.
Truthfully, on the port side they aren't doing anything that hasn't been done before. However on the starboard side, the whole thing is just crafted and performed well enough that it didn't matter terribly much at all to me that they were happy to sail around the Adriatic rather than head for that dark, unexplored corner of the metal map which warns "There be dragons!"
The first effort from Whales And Aurora is about as enjoyable as a booze cruise? a shipwreck of a release it is not.
Rating breakdown
Performance: | 8 |
Songwriting: | 8 |
Originality: | 7 |
Production: | 9 |
| Written on 26.10.2012 by BitterCOld has been officially reviewing albums for MetalStorm since 2009. |
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